*New Research Shows Mixed Results*

**Some Good And Bad News**

***CoreLogic, a provider of information, analytics and business services, today released its January Home Price Index (HPI) report. The report shows national home prices, including distressed sales, declined on a year-over-year basis by 3.1 percent in January 2012 and by 1.0 percent compared to December 2011, the sixth consecutive monthly decline. Nonetheless, there is some good news, too. Here’s the full story:

****Excluding distressed sales, year-over-year prices declined by 0.9 percent in January 2012 compared to January 2011, but that same metric posted a month-over-month gain, rising 0.7 percent in January. Distressed sales include short sales and real estate owned (REO) transactions.

****“Although home price declines are slowly improving and not far from the bottom, home prices are down to nearly the same levels as 10 years ago,” said Mark Fleming, chief economist for CoreLogic.

****Highlights of the Market as of January 2012 include:

****>> Including distressed sales, the five states with the highest appreciation were: South Dakota (+5.7 percent), North Dakota (+4.0 percent), West Virginia (+4.0 percent), Montana (+3.6 percent) and Michigan (+3.0 percent).

****>> Including distressed transactions, the peak-to-current change in the national HPI (from April 2006 to January 2012) was -34.0 percent. Excluding distressed transactions, the peak-to-current change in the HPI for the same period was -24.2 percent.

****>> The five states with the largest peak-to-current declines including distressed transactions are Nevada (-60.1 percent), Arizona (-50.8 percent), Florida (-49.0 percent), California (-43.6 percent) and Michigan (-43.2 percent). >> Of the top 100 Core Based Statistical Areas (CBSAs) measured by population, 71 are showing year-over-year declines in January, eight fewer than in December.